The smart contracts required for the DAO-NET and the Alternative to Tyranny (A2T) product lines are going to be large, complex and computationally intensive which on the Cardano mainnet is likely to make the transaction fees too expensive for several of the proposed usage cases. The proposed solution to this challenge is a dedicated sidechain shared by these two product lines.
Full implementation of a dedicated sidechain is beyond the capacity of the DAO Coders current small team of 5 individuals and frankly premature at this early stage of the product development cycle however a sidechain is expected to be required within 12 months therefore the design planning should start now.
This proposal is to produce a design document for a shared sidechain used by the DAO-NET and A2T product lines. The design document is to be freely available for community use under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License.
The challenge states that "Scaling solutions are inherently complex and require significant engineering effort", "Projects will likely take many months of engineering effort to implement viable solutions" and that there will be a requirement for Follow On Funding Rounds.
This proposed solution is for the first step in the complex and significant engineering effort in the challenge identified area of sidechain development. By making this engineering research publicly available, the entire community benefits thus helping increase scalability in multiple projects
The completed documentation will be shared on the DAO Coders website, Github and communicated in Town Halls.
The main risk involves finding a qualified sidechain design engineer willing to perform open source work at a rate that is likely to be funded under Project Catalyst, given the specialized skill set. To mitigate this risk, DAO Coders will reach out to IOG and the Cardano Foundation for possible recruiting assistance.
DAO Coders has several strategies to address the potential cost risks:
- By having multiple modular projects in each funding round there is a required overlap of funding to make each project functional on a stand-alone basis however as more projects are funded then the overlap can be used to cover potential shortfalls
- DAO Coders intends to launch a Mission Driven Stake Pool in May to help fund its operations
- Longer term solutions include a merchandising campaign (see the Merchandise Store project) and the DAO-NET: Development Funder project as additional revenue streams.